ABSTRACT
This paper’s subject has been internalised by Assyriologists from the beginning of their studies. I sometimes have to admit that this is so much the case that we are no longer aware of it.
Let me start with a riddle. Monsters seemingly roamed the fields of Ancient Mesopotamia in autumn and early winter. These are some of the prominent features which distinguish one of them:
It has a father and a mother and a wife; it has a head and a tongue and a hand and an arm; it wears a hat and is adorned with rings and earrings; it has an egg, a strangler, a chain and a bolt; a spoon, a chair and a stool, and it carries a yoke; there are boards and bonds, a sight and a ride.1
